


Light My Way

by moosh



Series: Pepperony Week 2019 [3]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Avengers Endgame, F/M, Fluff, Pregnancy, Wedding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-09
Updated: 2019-08-07
Packaged: 2020-02-28 21:29:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18764605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moosh/pseuds/moosh
Summary: Tony wakes up to a few surprises in the hospital after telling-off Steve and the rest of the Avengers.A missing scene drabble from Endgame.*edit* - I added a 2nd chapter in honor of Pepperony Week!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from a song called "Virginia May" by Gregory Alan Isakov.

Tony’s eyes fluttered open to the sound of a laugh. A laugh he knew very well. Pepper’s laugh. He looked around and tried to focus on something but everything was just so bright and so _beige_ that he started to panic for a moment, wondering if he was dead. **  
**

“Tony. Tony take a deep breath. You’re fine. You’re in the medbay at the compound. Tony?”

His senses were suddenly overwhelmed with Pepper as her voice filled his ears and her face came into focus over the top of him. He took a breath and blinked a few times and  _remembered_.

Spaceship. The Doctor. The kid. Space. Fight. Thanos.  _Dust._  Blue Girl. More Space. Glowing girl.  _His girl._  His Pepper. Right. He was home.

“What’s so funny?” He croaked out, looking around the room as he sat up. It was dark outside and the room was bathed in a soft glow from a lamp next to his bed. Rhodey was leaning in the corner by the door and Pepper was sitting next to him on the bed, holding his hand.

“Well we just ate dinner with a raccoon, which was pretty peculiar, all things considered.” Pepper smiled, squeezing his hand. “He seems very curious about you, and I think you’d like him funnily enough. Are you all right? You in any pain? You passed out earlier.”

“Yeah. I’m fine. Did - did I tell Steve to fuck off, or was that a dream?” Tony asked, having a very vague and fuzzy memory of calling Steve a liar.

“No yeah, that was real. And it was kinda awesome, but I think it took a lot out of you.” Rhodey said, stepping closer to the bed.

“Well I’ve been waiting to call him out for about 40 years, so there was a lot of rage there.” Tony chuckled, pinching the brim of his nose.

“You sure you feel alright? You can lay back down if you’re still out of it.” Pepper said as she reached up to run a hand through his hair, still marveling at the fact that he was here.

“No I’m good. I just - I want to sit up.” He sighed, feeling around for the remote to control for the bed. Pepper found it and moved it up into a sitting position, which Tony immediately leaned back into. Once he felt comfortable he turned his attention back to Pepper, who looked quite nervous and was fidgeting with something in her hands. She also kept sharing very knowing glances back and forth with Rhodey, and when she gave him a little nod, he turned to lock the door and shut the blinds. “Pep? What’s going on? Because I gotta say, if you’re choosing this moment to spring a threesome with Sourpatch on me uh, I’m going to have to decline.” He teased, still confused.

“ _Shut up._  No. No way. I um. I wanted to ask you something.” She stopped and chewed on her bottom lip nervously before glancing back at Rhodey one more time. With a deep breath she turned back to Tony and flipped the box open.

Tony’s stomach dropped when he laid his eyes on the rings. Their rings. Their wedding bands which they ordered right before - well -  _before_. They still hadn’t arrived by the time Tony stepped foot on the flying donut, which meant that both the jewelry industry and FedEx hadn’t completely closed up shop in the wake of half the population disappearing, which Tony found oddly comforting.

Pepper cleared her throat and held them out to him. “Anthony Edward Stark, will you marry me?”

Tony looked back and forth between her and the rings, slightly confused. “Didn’t we already do this? Live on TV? I know you remember because you’ve never let me forget it.”

She looked down at the rings and grinned. “You’re right. Let me rephrase. Anthony Edward Stark, will you marry me right now? Here. In this room.”

Tony grabbed the box and took a closer look at the rings. They were very simple, actually. Just plain, platinum bands. The inside of Pepper’s was supposed to say  _I love you_ , while the inside of Tony’s said  _I love you more_. It was just something silly they’d started saying to each other over the years.

“What? H-how?” Tony finally responded.

“I’ve got the license. It’s still valid, I think. Everything is kind of a mess right now, but it’s should still be valid. And Rhodey just signed up to be an Ordained Minister on the internet, so we should be good to go. And we can still have a real wedding someday, if you want to. But I just don’t care about dresses or cakes or bouquet tosses or anything else right now. I just want to marry you. I don’t want to spend another second not being your wife. So what do you say? Will you marry me, Tony?”

Tony swallowed hard, feeling some tears welling up in the corners of his eyes. “Yeah. Yes. Of course. Fuck yes, let’s do this Pep.” He said pulling the smaller ring out of the box and sitting up a little more. He handed the box back to Pepper and turned to Rhodey. “What do we do?”

“Well, you guys can, you know, say some stuff to teach other. Exchange vows. But if you don’t feel like winging it I’ve got a standard script from the website where I got ordained.”

Tony turned back to Pepper, who was rolling his ring around in her fingers. “I uh - I don’t know about you, but a script sounds really appealing right now. I’m sick of improvising.” He said quietly, thinking back to all of the _winging it_ he’d been doing for the past month. He was so over it. So exhausted.

“A script sounds great.” She beamed, reaching out and grabbing his hand again. “Come on, let’s do this.” She said, turning back to Rhodey, who was now standing at the foot of the bed, presumably searching for the script on his phone. Tony was glad that it was just the three of them. It just felt right.

Rhodey cleared his throat and smiled. “All right. Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to witness something that should have happened about 20 years ago. The marriage of this this dumbass to this perfect specimen of a woman.”

Tony and Pepper both chuckled at his words, knowing that he was right. It still felt a little weird to laugh though in the wake of everything that had happened, but sometimes the giggles just found their way out.

“Do you, Anthony Edward Stark, take this woman, Virginia Mae Potts - “ They all stopped to snicker for a moment at the use of Pepper’s full name, which was always weird. “ - to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, keeping yourself solely unto her for as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.” Tony said, locking eyes with Pepper and slipping the ring onto her finger.

“And do you, Virginia Mae Potts take this man, Anthony Edward Stark, to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, keeping yourself solely unto him for as long as you both shall live?”

“I do.” Pepper said with a big smile, slipping the ring onto Tony’s finger. It was a little big on him since he’d lost so much weight in space, but they were working on fattening him up again. She was confident that it would fit better soon.

“Well, then by the power vested in me by the State of New York, I now pronounce you husband and wife.”

Pepper leaned up and cupped Tony’s cheek before giving him a big kiss. They kept their foreheads resting against each other for a moment before Tony turned to Rhodey. “No comments about seals this time?”

“Nah, it didn’t want to ruin the moment again.”

“Thanks man. For everything.” Tony said reaching out to grab his friend’s hand, giving it a squeeze. He’d always been there for him and for them, and he apparently never left Pepper’s side during those first few days after the snap when everything was in chaos.

“Yeah, of course. You know how much I love you guys.” Rhodey said, giving Tony’s hand a squeeze as well before stepping back to the table by the door. He leaned down to sign something and then held it up to show them. It was the marriage license. “Well, there you go. You’re legit. Mazel tov. I’m gonna leave you guys to it now, though.”

“Thank you Rhodey.” Pepper called after him as he stepped out, before turning her attention back to Tony. She ran her hands through his hair again and gave him another kiss. He was still so weak and so malnourished and in desperate need of a shave but he was here. And alive. And they were married now, which was weird. She kicked her shoes off and carefully crawled up next to him, avoiding all of the tubes and cables as best as she could. She wrapped an arm around him and pulled him down to rest his head on her shoulder, pressing a kiss to his forehead as he settled against her.

“I love you, Pepper.”

“I love you too, Tony. There’s something I need to tell you.”

“Hm?”

“You were right. I’m pregnant.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Added a 2nd chapter in honor of Pepperony Week!
> 
> Day #5 - Missing Scene (5 years mid-Endgame)

Tony blinked a few times before sitting up and staring at her. “W-what?”

 

“I’m pregnant.”

 

He was still struggling for words as he stared at her, his mouth slightly agape. “How?”

 

“Well, sometimes, when a man loves a woman very much, that man will come to her office in the middle of the day and insist on a quick fuck in an empty meeting room.” Pepper teased with a smile.

 

Tony’s mind was cloudy with a million different thoughts though. “I just - I thought - I thought you said - you were still on the pill? Right?“

 

“No - I was - I just...it was right when all of that stuff was going on with the Tokyo office and we were doing all of the wedding bullshit and being hounded by the paparazzi and I was really stressed out and I - I might have missed a day or two. I don’t know. I was a mess. But all I know is that we hadn’t really seen each other in a few days because I’d been so busy and so when you came to the office and I wasn’t even  _ thinking _ about the fact that missed a ay and well...here we are.” She explained, searching his face for any sort of indication of how he was feeling.

 

She’d gone through every single emotion she’d ever thought possible over the past few weeks. From complete and total devastation at the loss of life and the loss of Tony, to joy and confusion and panic when the doctor asked her if she knew she was pregnant. And anger, so much anger. And fear. And guilt.

 

Tony was still just staring at her though, his eyes wide, as he let it sink in. “We’re - we’re gonna have a  _ baby _ ?” He asked, his voice breaking on the last word as his demeanor finally softened and a smile crept onto his face.

 

Pepper smiled and nodded, tears welling up as a wave of relief coursed through her body. “Yeah. I know the timing isn’t... _ great. _ And Lord knows that bringing a child into  _ this _ world right now might not be the best decision but neither of us is getting any younger and I  _ want _ this so much and I know you do too, or at least you did and I just hope - “ 

 

Tony cut her off with a kiss, hoping to convey at least some of what he was feeling. Yeah, the timing wasn’t great. Nothing was great. In fact, it was all pretty terrible. He couldn’t stop thinking about Peter and dust and space and how cold he still was and how close to death he’d been yet again. But he also couldn’t stop thinking about Pepper, and how lucky he was to still have her. He didn’t know how to fix what happened. Hell, he didn’t even know if he  _ could _ . But he had Pepper, and they were married now, and they were going to have a baby, and that was going to have to be enough for right now.

 

“I’ve never wanted anything more, Pep.” He said, trying to reassure her. “Oh my  _ god _ , we’re gonna have a baby! We need like...a crib and diapers and one of those baby bjorns and - “

 

It was now Pepper’s turn to cut him off with a kiss, not wanting him to get worked up. He was still weak and it had been a big 15 minutes for him, what with both getting married and finding out that he was going to be a dad. “We’ve got plenty of time. Just lay back down, all right?” She said, guiding him back to lay against her chest as she leaned back into the bed. She reached over to her purse and fished out an envelope to give him. “Here. It’s an ultrasound picture from last week. Right before you got back. So, it’s about 8 weeks.”

 

Tony frantically pulled the picture out and just stared at it for a moment. He’d seen plenty of ultrasounds before on TV and in movies and always thought that people who got emotional about a blurry black and white image were nuts. Now though? He got it. He totally got it. “Oh wow.” He said, blinking back a few tears. “That lump’s our kid, huh?”

 

Pepper chuckled and pressed a kiss to the top of Tony’s head, hearing the wobble in his voice. “Yeah.”

 

“Who else knows?” Tony asked, still staring at the picture.

 

“Just Rhodey. I didn’t - I wanted to wait. For a few more weeks. I’m not exactly  _ young _ and I didn’t want to say anything just in case…”

 

“You’ll be fine, Pep. You’ll both be fine.” Tony cut her off, not even wanting to entertain that thought.

 

Pepper took the picture from him and set it aside so that she could better wrap her arms around him and just hold him close. “I love you.”

 

“I love you too. So I guess this means no champagne for our wedding night?”

 

“You can have some if you want.”

 

“I’m not sure that’s the best idea. Once drink and I’d probably be out like a light.”

 

“Good, you need the rest.”

 

They fell silent for a while, even though there was so much more to say. Tony still felt guilty and bringing a child into this world felt incredibly selfish, but at the same time he was full of genuine joy. He and Pepper were  _ married _ now. They had rings and signed piece of paper. They were legit. And even though those items were arbitrary and didn’t mean much in the grand scope of things, it still felt good. And they were going to have a  _ baby _ . A pure, genuine soul who would know nothing of the pain and suffering that the world had suffered, and that was a good thing. Maybe the best thing. A little bit of light in the darkness.

 

“Do you still like the name Morgan?” He asked, breaking the silence. “I still like it. Plus it works for any and all gender expressions.”

 

“Yeah. I still like Morgan. I’ve been referring to them as Morgan in my head, so I think that’s what we’re going to have to stick with.”

 

“Perfect. Morgan Stark. I like it. We can fight over the middle name later.” He said, placing a hand on Pepper’s stomach and looking down. “Hey Morgan.” He whispered. “I can’t wait to meet you. I’ve had so many dreams about you, and I can’t wait to watch them come true.”


End file.
